Nerfing the coast is just annoying

[Stilgar08]

Deserts and snow, for example, were formidable barriers to cross, at least as difficult if not more difficult than crossing mountains. Sailing up a coast, however, was relatively easy. Yet Civ 6 requires you to research a special tech before you can move on water.

I might flip this on it's head. Make Desert, Snow (even Mountain) tiles uncrossable until you research a leaf tech that first lets civilian units (and Scouts) cross them, then another leaf tech to allow military units to cross them. Civilian units (including Scouts) should, however, be able to sail along coastal waters from the start. Plus up rivers, which has a technical issue with Civ 6's implementation discussed elsewhere with respect to Norway. Galleys and the ability for military units to sail can still be on a leaf tech.

Won't happen in Civ VI and I'm fine with it.

The way slower climate change is going to help with tiles in danger of submerging evens out the raise from 35 to 45% (I hope). Flood barriers will need to be feasible, they don't need to be "easy to get" IMO. It's ok if you have to work for them, it's not if it takes you 50+turns...
Some harbour production might go a long way helping coastal cities... Double trade routes would be overkill, but I like the idea of reflecting the advantage from traders being sent from coastal cities. How about doubling their movement - 2tiles / turn, hereby cutting duration in half? Therefore making them much more flexible and later they can help building those expensive barriers

 

[Depravo]

Very true, that in the most ancient times nobody built on the coast: nobody had the technology to exploit the sea until efficient sails were developed and applied. But that took place well before the Classical Era (Bronze Age sailing vessels were traversing the Mediterranean and Black Seas by 2000 BCE, possibly earlier) and after that, the sea was the preferred highway for trade, and that and rivers were the only way to feed a really big city: Babylon and Antioch on rivers, Rome, Alexandria, Athens, Syracuse, Carthage, Tyre, Byzantium - all on the coast or up a short river/portage like Rome and Athens. The Romans built 1500 ton capacity grain freighters to run grain from North Africa to Rome, the biggest ships seen anywhere until the medieval Chinese ocean-going 'Junks'.

So, the fact remains, for most of the game, the sea should be a lot more important than it is now.

There is also that all the most ancient civilisations were based around great rivers, and great rivers tend to be most workable in their middle reaches, disappearing into vast swamps in advance of the coast.

True of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley and the earliest Chinese cultures. All the Sumerian power centres were built at what then was about as far down river as you could walk without sinking into the mud.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

Again, going to 'piggy back' on a lot of interesting and thoughtful ideas here , , ,

1. Harbors earlier - at Sailing is not too early, I think, and Harbor = Trade Route is not out of line either: Minoan Crete was a sea trade civilization in the Ancient Era/Bronze Age, with ships (we've built a replica based on undersea wrecks and images) that could carry 30 tons with an 8 man crew and go 200+ miles a day. Nothing on land could do that for another 3400 years!
2. Before the nominal Start of Game people were already moving over the sea: Crete was settled by people with their domestic animals (sheep, goats, dogs) 2000 years before the game starts, the Aegean islands up to 1000 years before that. Letting Scouts and 'Civilian' units cross Coastal Waters is not out of line. In fact, that could be the Coastal Start Bonus instead of a Eureka for sailing. Found a city on the coast, get "Boating" as an Automatic Starting Tech. Note that would also also Coasta; Cities to 'exploit' coastal sea Resources early, or coastal islands - which is historically accurate compared to the artificial limitation in th game now.
3. Getting more tiles on the water. One possibility might be a Cree-Like bonus for Sea Trade Routes: such a route automatically extends the city radius along the route for X number of tiles. Since early trade routes will all be traced through Coastal Waters only, that should give the city 'extra' tiles to work, possibly with Resources.
4. Transportation. Couldn't agree more. Not only sea transport, but river transport was absolutely essential to move anything bulky for any distance. This affected city placement all over the world, and not only for access to fresh water.
For two examples:
A. ALL the major Pre-19th century City States in Russia were on rivers, because there is simply no other way to traverse the distances in Russia except by water. Moscow is where it is and as important as it is because it was right in the middle of everything: within a short distance to the north, south, northwest or west were the Southern Dvinia, Volga, Dnepr, and Dnestr Rivers: giving access, respectively, to the Baltic Sea, the Caspian Sea and Asia, the Ukraine and Constantinopol/Istanbul, and the Don/Black Sea.
B. The 'low countries' (Belgium. Holland, northeastern France) were the fighting pit of Europe in the 17th - 18th centuries. Why? Because everyplace there is within a day's march of a river. You can maintain large armies there by water-borne supply lines better than anywhere else in Europe. Anyplace else, the armies could not, for example, settle down and beseige a city easily, because hey would eat the countryside bare of food within a few days or weeks, and have to move on or starve.

I do not particularly want to see a game of Logistics in History, but rivers and the sea affected the supply and support of both cities and armies enormously, and right now the game doesn't simulate any of that effectively. At least a nod to those historical effects would be nice, and I think it would make a better game.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

There is also that all the most ancient civilisations were based around great rivers, and great rivers tend to be most workable in their middle reaches, disappearing into vast swamps in advance of the coast.

True of ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, the Indus Valley and the earliest Chinese cultures. All the Sumerian power centres were built at what then was about as far down river as you could walk without sinking into the mud.

The marshy deltas of the great rivers were very bad city sites: no solid land, frequently malarial mosquitoes, and no need: any major city near such a place was built on the edge of the delta, like Alexandria on the western edge of the Nile delta, or at the point where the river 'splits' into the delta, like Cairo or Antwerp. (New Orleans is the exception that Proves The Point: there is a small 'patch' of firm ground by the river in the middle of the delta, now called the 'French Quarter', but as soon as the city expanded beyond that, it was all in low ex-swamp and dangerously exposed to the river and the sea, as has been abundantly proven many times)

Also, there's not always a good reason for a city there at all. I still remember a Population Geography professor in college with a Trick Question: he'd point at a map of Europe and ask: "Where's the mouth of the Danube in historical geographic terms?"
The answer is: Constantinople/Istanbul, because there is nothing at the mouth of the Danube except a swamp and a small town (Constanta, Rumania) on the edge of the delta. That's because anybody poling down the Danube hit the Black Sea and immediately hung a right and headed for The Navel of the World, the Norse' "Micklegard" where all trade in the region converged. Anything at the place where the Danube physically met the sea was redundant, and while there has been some kind of settlement there since at least Classical times, it was never large or important compared to the Byzantium site just to the south.

 

[kaspergm]

1. Harbors earlier - at Sailing is not too early, I think, and Harbor = Trade Route is not out of line either: Minoan Crete was a sea trade civilization in the Ancient Era/Bronze Age, with ships (we've built a replica based on undersea wrecks and images) that could carry 30 tons with an 8 man crew and go 200+ miles a day. Nothing on land could do that for another 3400 years!

I agree with almost everything you said, but I'm a bit dubious about moving Harbors to Sailing. I think a better solution would be to extent the Worker embark bonus to also include Settlers and Scouts - I wouldn't be against it including all units (after all, it says sailing, and what do you do when you sail, if not transport people across the sea?).

On top of that, I would move Celestial Navigation back a column, so it sits in Ancient era right after Sailing and in the same column as Masonry and Bronze Working. This would make Harbors somewhat more accessible. I would also move Shipbuilding a column back, so it sits in early Classical era, I would kick Buttresses out of the naval tech line and replace it with something like Enforced Hull, and then I would add some medieval naval units around this point (Galleass, Cog).

 

[Tomice]

We concluded that the vanilla 1.0 solution where both harbors and markets have trade routes was overpowered.

But what about giving cities founded directly on the coast an extra trade route???
It would unlock very early (foreign trade) and could compensate the overall lower yields of coastal cities quite well.

To clarify: only a city with direct coastal adjacency could have 2 trade routes, one when founded and another one with either lighthouse or market.

 

[Depravo]

The marshy deltas of the great rivers were very bad city sites: no solid land, frequently malarial mosquitoes, and no need: any major city near such a place was built on the edge of the delta, like Alexandria on the western edge of the Nile delta, or at the point where the river 'splits' into the delta, like Cairo or Antwerp. (New Orleans is the exception that Proves The Point: there is a small 'patch' of firm ground by the river in the middle of the delta, now called the 'French Quarter', but as soon as the city expanded beyond that, it was all in low ex-swamp and dangerously exposed to the river and the sea, as has been abundantly proven many times)

Also, there's not always a good reason for a city there at all. I still remember a Population Geography professor in college with a Trick Question: he'd point at a map of Europe and ask: "Where's the mouth of the Danube in historical geographic terms?"
The answer is: Constantinople/Istanbul, because there is nothing at the mouth of the Danube except a swamp and a small town (Constanta, Rumania) on the edge of the delta. That's because anybody poling down the Danube hit the Black Sea and immediately hung a right and headed for The Navel of the World, the Norse' "Micklegard" where all trade in the region converged. Anything at the place where the Danube physically met the sea was redundant, and while there has been some kind of settlement there since at least Classical times, it was never large or important compared to the Byzantium site just to the south.

If you want a good read about this area, get 'Frontiers in Question', which details the great lengths the Byzantines went to to secure and civilise this area in the 11th-12th after it had been captured from the Bulgars.

Svyatoslav Igorevich established a 'capital' at Preslav / Pereyaslavets in the Danube delta, as the Bulgars had before him at Pliska and elsewhere, but it's pretty clear that was a staging point for his (and their) planned capture of the City of Men's Desire.

From Wiki: 'Svyatoslav explained to his courtiers that it was to Pereyaslavets, the centre of his lands, that "all the riches would flow: gold, silks, wine, and various fruits from Greece, silver and horses from Hungary and Bohemia, and from Rus' furs, wax, honey, and slaves".'

Sound reasoning except 'all the riches of Greece' still had to pass under the Emperor's nose at Constantinople. Of course he will have realised this all too well, but his career ended rather suddenly before he could take on the end boss.

 

[criZp]

The problem with extra trade routes is that it becomes so much to manage mid to late game (I've tried with a mod)

In a later version of the same mod I made it so that cities next to coast got a trade capacity at pop 10, while cities inland needed pop 15. But I don't think that's a great solution either.

I think better would be to get rid of the domestic/international yield split, where domestic gives food/production and international gives mainly gold + a bit of other stuff. Both types of trade give food, production, and gold. International trade also give culture/science bonus a la Peter of Russia, not depending on presence of districts. Faith can maybe be generated from the amount of religious followers in the target city (regardless if it's foreign or domestic).

The "efficiency bonus" for gold should also apply to food and production. Perhaps this bonus should be binary, so that if all trade is along water/railroad then you get full efficiency bonus, otherwise you get no such bonus. That would be a big boost to putting the city on the coast instead of a few tiles inland and making a harbor in the 3rd ring.

 

[kaspergm]

I think better would be to get rid of the domestic/international yield split, where domestic gives food/production and international gives mainly gold + a bit of other stuff. Both types of trade give food, production, and gold. International trade also give culture/science bonus a la Peter of Russia, not depending on presence of districts. Faith can maybe be generated from the amount of religious followers in the target city (regardless if it's foreign or domestic).

The "efficiency bonus" for gold should also apply to food and production. Perhaps this bonus should be binary, so that if all trade is along water/railroad then you get full efficiency bonus, otherwise you get no such bonus. That would be a big boost to putting the city on the coast instead of a few tiles inland and making a harbor in the 3rd ring.

Just a thought, and maybe better allocated to another thread, but:

What if trade route yields were reworked completely, so that:

• Food can only be transported via water (ocean or river must connect cities) or via railroad. Trade route will yield food depending on number of resources and improvements at start city: Bonus resources (Fish, Crabs, Rice, Wheat, Bananas, Cows, Sheep and Dear) all yield +1 food. Each farm of fishery all provide +0.25 food.
• Production can only be transported via (ocean or river must connect cities) or via railroad. Trade route will yield production depending on number of resources and improvements at start city: Each strategic resource all yield +1 production. Each mine or lumbermill will provide +0.25 production.
• All trade routes will yield gold depending on luxury resources in origin city. Market will boost trade route gold.
• All trade routes can yield culture, faith and science depending on districts in origin city.

 

[cvb]

A coastal city would then acquire land tiles at the same rate as a landlocked city. Sea tiles would be acquired as a bonus.
In other words: If an inland city unlocks 3 new tiles in 50 turns, a coastal city should unlock 3 land tiles PLUS 3 water tiles during the same time. This buff should exclusively apply to city centers directly situated at the coast.
This would not increase the maximal potential of coastal cities, but significantly buff them during the development phase.

Well, perhaps a simple Lua implementation could be initiated by Events.CityTileOwnershipChanged (when the "city manager" gives a new tile to a city), check whether that cityID's city center tile is adjacent to coast and then treat for a given Plot:IsWater an additional land tile (random nonOwner tile from mostinner ring) & vice versa (for a given land tile an additional sea tile) via Plot:SetOwner.

 

[Boris Gudenuf]

I agree with almost everything you said, but I'm a bit dubious about moving Harbors to Sailing. I think a better solution would be to extent the Worker embark bonus to also include Settlers and Scouts - I wouldn't be against it including all units (after all, it says sailing, and what do you do when you sail, if not transport people across the sea?).

I originally proposed a 'mini-Tech' of "Boating" to implement pretty much what you've proposed. See The Next Expansion: a Few Suggestions , the second Post: "Making the Seas Great Again". Moving the Harbor back to Sailing is justified by the historical reality, but, especially if the numerous proposals in this Post for Harbor bonuses were adopted all or in part, would probably be a Bad Idea from the standpoint of play balance.

On top of that, I would move Celestial Navigation back a column, so it sits in Ancient era right after Sailing and in the same column as Masonry and Bronze Working. This would make Harbors somewhat more accessible. I would also move Shipbuilding a column back, so it sits in early Classical era, I would kick Buttresses out of the naval tech line and replace it with something like Enforced Hull, and then I would add some medieval naval units around this point (Galleass, Cog).

A suitable 'naval' Tech in the early Medieval Era might be something like Ship Fitting or Naval Architecture. Since Cogs used in combat were simply merchant Cogs with (originally) collapsable towers or 'castles added fore and aft to house missile troops, and hulls filled with melee troops, I'd love to see them implemented in the game with a nod to their 'civilian' origins: maybe allow you to build a 'war Cog' at great Production/Gold expense, or 'convert' a naval Sea Trade Route into a Cog unit at 1/2 the price of buying the unit..

 

[Trav'ling Canuck]

Just a thought, and maybe better allocated to another thread, but:

What if trade route yields were reworked completely, so that:

• Food can only be transported via water (ocean or river must connect cities) or via railroad. Trade route will yield food depending on number of resources and improvements at start city: Bonus resources (Fish, Crabs, Rice, Wheat, Bananas, Cows, Sheep and Dear) all yield +1 food. Each farm of fishery all provide +0.25 food.
• Production can only be transported via (ocean or river must connect cities) or via railroad. Trade route will yield production depending on number of resources and improvements at start city: Each strategic resource all yield +1 production. Each mine or lumbermill will provide +0.25 production.
• All trade routes will yield gold depending on luxury resources in origin city. Market will boost trade route gold.
• All trade routes can yield culture, faith and science depending on districts in origin city.

Great ideas!

This thread, in general, is the most enjoyable read on this forum that I've had in a year.

 

[bizwan]

Great ideas!

This thread, in general, is the most enjoyable read on this forum that I've had in a year.

Seconded. Sea trade/routes have always been important. Even today, to move quantity (commercial or military) requires sea or rail. Wonderful thread!

 

[acluewithout]

Coastal Cities are always going to suck if all FXS does is try to make them "as good" as non-coast all cities. Coastal Cities have an inherent "negative" in Civ because they are a little more exposed militarily and in terms of loyalty. And as @Victoria has pointed out, they get smashed by climate change much more than inland cities. Adding buffs here and there is also not transparent / gamey.

Coastal Cities need a real reason to be preferred that ideally emerges from the underlying mechanics. They need to be distinct versus inland cities.

Very, very broadly the current design of Civ VI seems to be inland cities are more inclined to have all the hammers and science and resources. Coastal Cities seem to be inclined to have all the gold. ( I'm not sure there's meant to be a huge different in how tall these cities are - coastals actually have more housing as default, both get the same housing from rivers, and both potentially have access to more food and housing via improvements although we could quibble over whether farms are better than fish.)

Thing is, Gold isn't a great use case for Coastals in the current meta. I think overall Coastals do have more gold potential because they can build both CHs and Harbours, and Sea Resources give gold. But you can get more than enough Gold from inland cities and from trade and cards and from trading with the AI and from Pillaging. Oh my!

Then there's chopping, which makes gold, hammers and food all largely irrelevant anyway, and chopping clearly favours inland over coastal cities. You can't build Space Ports with Crabs, only Stones and Jungle (although Crabs will buy you great people etc.).

As I said, I think the original design was for Coastals to have more trade routes by allowing trade stacking, which actually fit really well with the historical advantages of coastals and gave Coastal Cities a more destinctive advantage. I'm fine with no more stacking - too much micro - but it does mean Coastals don't have a big thing they are particularly good at early game which undermines their desirability versus inland Cities.

Funnily enough, FXS have sort of brought back some stacking and or trade focus given both Harbours and CHs get bonuses from City States now (I assume they stack) and the new trade efficiency rules. I just don't think these are enough of an incentive.

I really don't think moving Harbours in the Tech Tree is the solution, and it would actually undermine the current Coastal City bonus that they can build boats from the start. That said, I think maybe Commercial Hubs need to be harder to get or Trade Routes from markets need to be harder to get, to offset how it's more difficult to get Harbours up and return Coastals to being the "trade" Cities versus inland Cities being the "make units and science" Cities.

Basically, the game should incentivise players to beeline Harbours for trade, not Commercial Hubs. Currently it does the opposite.

Off the top of my head, I think maybe one or more of the following could help:

- Harbours give Trade Routes without the Lighthouse whereas Commercial Hubs need Markets. That would make Harbours way more powerful, although would also lose the current symmetry.

- Make Harbours cheaper than Commercial Hubs would maybe work (maybe via a policy card, a bit like Encampments), although that would make the RND and Cothon super cheap (less of an issue if the discount is tied to a policy card).

- Give Coastal Cities a free Trading Post, or awarding a free one once they build a Lighthouse would also help. This seems like a no-brainer to me, although maybe isn't all that powerful overall.

- Make Coastals more important to an empire's overall economy; eg after say Steel, Cities get +1 Hammer for being connected by rail to a City with a Shipyard or for having a Shipyard. Or just have some Policy Cards that better leverage Harbours etc. Or Harbours give Major Adjacencies to Commercial Hubs, IZ and Campuses (not just Commercial Hubs).

- Temper some of the current negatives for Coastal Cities (although this won't really help make them different). eg +1 Housing from fishing boats instead of +0.5 Housing (or maybe increasing to +1 Housing after Cartography or after you build a Lighthouse or Shipyqrd); or maybe Sea Ports provide some protection from Storms and or Flooding.

Circling back to the OP, I really like the idea of Coastal Flooding and Climate Change. But if we're going to have that, there needs to be more "reward" for having coastal cities to offset the additional "risks" involved. And overall, Coastal Cities need more of a reason to be in the game beyond just more gold.

 

[Archon_Wing]

Just make coastal (not ocean) tiles 2f2g .

 

[BrotherInJah]

I'm sorry, but what costal cities we are talking here? Most of my costal cities are placed on rivers, so no housing problem here. Most of them have good number of land tiles to get production. If you build cities in crapy place don't expect to much from it. Let it rot..

 

[kaspergm]

Coastal Cities are always going to suck if all FXS does is try to make them "as good" as non-coast all cities. Coastal Cities have an inherent "negative" in Civ because they are a little more exposed militarily and in terms of loyalty.
(...)
I really don't think moving Harbours in the Tech Tree is the solution, and it would actually undermine the current Coastal City bonus that they can build boats from the start. That said, I think maybe Commercial Hubs need to be harder to get or Trade Routes from markets need to be harder to get, to offset how it's more difficult to get Harbours up and return Coastals to being the "trade" Cities versus inland Cities being the "make units and science" Cities.

Basically, the game should incentivise players to beeline Harbours for trade, not Commercial Hubs. Currently it does the opposite.

Off the top of my head, I think maybe one or more of the following could help:

- Harbours give Trade Routes without the Lighthouse whereas Commercial Hubs need Markets. That would make Harbours way more powerful, although would also lose the current symmetry.

- Make Harbours cheaper than Commercial Hubs would maybe work (maybe via a policy card, a bit like Encampments), although that would make the RND and Cothon super cheap (less of an issue if the discount is tied to a policy card).

- Give Coastal Cities a free Trading Post, or awarding a free one once they build a Lighthouse would also help. This seems like a no-brainer to me, although maybe isn't all that powerful overall.

I agree, lots of good discussion going on here.

I have a question for some of the more competitive players: How often is the Pottery-Writing-Currency beeline used to get quick Commercial Hubs? I'm not a particularly competitive player myself, so I usually fiddle around in the ancient era for too long - and I usually waste my early district slots on stuff like Holy Sites and Encampments - so I often find myself having my Commercial Hubs coming up fairly late, and I think the production costs for Markets is non-trivial. But then again, I'm not a big chopper. Anyway, if delaying Commercial Hubs would actually have value in balance, one could add another prerequisite tech for Currency, although the obvious choice - Bronze Working - sits somewhat awkwardly off path in the current tech tree.

I was never much of a fan of the Market/Lighthouse requirement for the extra trade route. I think a good way to buff coastal cities would be to remove the Lighthouse requirement, but keep the Market requirement. This makes sense in several ways: Both because Lighthouses by nature and in terms of in-game effect doesn't have a lot to do with trading. And because it would balance out the production difference between inland and coastal cities.

I also think that once again, chopping needs to be looked into. The fact that the whole competitive game meta seems to be centered around chopping speaks volumes. Nerfing chopping would have a much needed in-direct boost to coastal cities.

 

[kb27787]

Here's an idea... Make trade routes exclusive to the CH and market... No longer routes from harbors.
Then buff lighthouse to +2f +1p per sea tile (similar to BNW) and harbors give +0.5 housing for each water tile improvement (boats, oil rigs, fisheries, kampungs)

This would incentivize building both CH and harbors in a city.

 

[Victoria]

*** key post ***
I have dug into the files rather than being anecdotal in what I am trying to say and was surprised to see it worse than I thought.
Even turning to slider 0 you still get events occurring so you cannot turn off random events.
Looking at the 4 storm categories (hurricane, sand, tornado and snow) they all have the same damage chances with the exception of hurricanes which regardless of severity guarantee 100% to pillage all improvement and districts that are built on coastal lowlands. So even if you build flood barriers the lowlands on the coast get hit bad every time.

If we exclude the coastal lowlands the chance of occurrence and damage is the same so all should be equal, right? Nope, a tornado family damages one tile and a tornado outbreak damages 3 tiles. A dust storm damages 3 tiles and a haboob 7 tiles. Blizzards and hurricanes however damage 7 tiles if mild and 19 tiles if severe. The only military unit that can get damaged more than 60% is naval which can get 80% damaged in a cat 5 hurricane. Blizzards are as bad ... so GS has nerfed tundra and coastal cities much more than other cities but coastal cities worse because of coastal lowlands.... and in this patch they will increase the amount of coastal lowlands.

This now explains why my coastal cities get really badly hammered and my inland ones do not, ignoring the fact that coastal cities can still be hit by sandstorms, tornadoes and blizzards. GS has really nerfed naval civs.... and is yet another reason why Canada is rubbish.

Rather than just complaining... especially as the storm sizes and damage seem RL, the real issue is as has already been specified so well in this thread. That cities on the coast should be better than inland cities as per RL which then gives the current punishing coastal design some balance. However, the opposite is currently in effect, poor start and crippled later.

 

[kb27787]

Wow ok... makes me glad I main Kongo then... (rainforest starts are immune to drought from what I know... the mbanzas are still counted as rainforests even though they are districts, haboob, blizzards and mostly hurricane as they are well inland... I have yet seen a tornado form in rainforest either....) only things I've been hit with are floods (easy enough to build dams or to avoid building anything but wonders on the flood plains) and the occasional volcano eruption (which, I know to put city centers 3 tiles away so no pop loss on my part, but still good tile increasing yields). Natural disasters don't really make that big of a difference in my games.

I should think Kongo and Brazil get indirect buffs in GS then.

Global warming? Well? Who told you to settle coasts? (could've told you coasts were horrible ) You would do better settling a non-freshwater city inland where at least you could get chops than on the coasts... if you want coastal stuff or boats just settle with the water tile in the 3rd ring and build a harbor there when you need. Saves you the hassle since your 1st and 2nd ring tiles will most likely contain useful choppable stuff.

About the comment where people settle at rivers' mouths--wouldn't you do much better off settling, you know, 2-3 tiles upstream? Chances are you'll have more hills and woods and overall the city will be more efficient in its use of border growth.